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Computer Graphics	Stargazing and Star-Reading The Babylonian astronomers possessed a charming naivete and candor, which today enable us to observe the gradual development of star-reading, or astrology, side by side and in pace with astronomy. It was obvious to everyone that the stars had an influence upon the Earth. By its height in the sky the Sun regulated the seasons and brought drought and rainy months. When the Pleiades reappeared out of the sunshine, about the time of the spring new Moan, there were devastating storms. This effect of the Seven Sisters is described in a very ancient Sumerian hymn: "The winter storms, the wicked demons, engendered in the firmament, raise their heads; mischief they wreak, evil they ponder, day after day; seven their number, heralds of their King Anu; roaring their wrathful hurricane in the sky. Before the radiant Moan they have subsided." The Moon was itself a weather-maker-and is so considered to this day, despite the lack of meteorological evidence. Certainly the monthly period of women seems to point to same mysterious human relationship with the Moon. The Babylonians believed they had discovered a considerable number of additional ties. A new king, for example, would have a long reign if its first month turned out to be longer than had been calculated, or if two stars set together at the moment the Moon reached its zenith. A ring around the rising Moon foretold the birth of a crown prince. If a new Moon appeared precisely at the beginning of a thirty-day month, it meant good fortune for the entire country. Similar influences were ascribed to the planets. The Babylonian astronomers must have been astonished and alarmed when they observed that some of the stars were also wanderers and moved in the same paths as the Moon and the Sun-that is, through the zodiac. Two of these, the morning and the evening star, even revealed themselves to be one and the same planet which was overtaken by the Sun, so that it sometimes appeared on the right, sometimes on the left of the Sun. The Babylonians solemnly appointed it their third principal heavenly body, and frequently depicted it with eight rays, alongside the sickle of the Moon and the disc of the Sun. it seemed obvious that a change in the positions of the morning star must have an important meaning. A cuneiform tablet dating from around 2000 B.C. declared: "When Ishtar [Venus] is visible in the east on the sixth of Abu, there will be rain and destruction. Until the tenth of Nisan it remains easterly; on the eleventh it vanishes and remains invisible for three months. If, then, it glows in the west again on the eleventh of Du'uzu, there will be fighting in the land, but the fruits of the fields will prosper." Venus, however, had surprises in store for the Babylonians. With their customary honesty, they recorded their consternation on burnt clay: "When the planet Ishtar enters the Scorpion, floods take place, as is well known. This time, however, there were none, for as soon as Ishtar came up to the breast of the Scorpion, she was snatched away. Although she touched the Scorpion, she did not penetrate it." This was the Babylonians' first acquaintance with one of the great puzzles of ancient astronomical science: the occasional retrograde motion of the planets. Similar motion was observed in the case of the other planets, and with equal surprise: "Mar-Istar to the King: As to Marduk [Jupiter], I recently reported. My prediction was based on his position in the Anu path [the celestial equator]. I now report: he has been delayed. He has truly run backward; therefore my interpretation was mistaken. But it would not have been mistaken if Marduk had remained on the Anu path. May my Lord King understand this." In any case, there can be no doubt that the path of scientific astronomy led through the fields of astrology in all ancient civilizations. Even the Chinese observed the retrograde motion of Jupiter only because they considered this bright star a harbinger of good fortune. As soon as they discovered Jupiter's inexplicable irregularity, they decided that it was an omen of famine. . The Babylonians surpassed all other peoples of antiquity in the patience, precision, and impartiality of their observations. Not content with the usual interpretation of the stars based upon empirical rules, they created a different, a dogmatic system of astrology.